


Absolution has Two Daddies

by lonelywalker



Category: Cowboys & Aliens (2011)
Genre: Amnesia, Intercrural Sex, M/M, Older Characters, Post-Movie(s), Western
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-12
Updated: 2011-08-12
Packaged: 2017-10-22 13:34:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/238583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lonelywalker/pseuds/lonelywalker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Taggart is abducted by aliens, Dolarhyde needs to know that there's at least one thing he still remembers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Absolution has Two Daddies

“John.”

“Woodrow.”

The American frontier is never as vast as anyone expects. It should be simple to lose oneself there, out on the lawless plains where Indians and bandits roam. It should be strange to encounter any civilized man, and unthinkable to run into the same person twice.

Ever since the war, Woodrow Dolarhyde has barely gone three weeks without finding John Taggart staring at him across a crowded saloon, picking up the pieces of a stagecoach that’s been shot to pieces, or simply making small talk in that strangely sincere tone of his.

Taggart’s never been Dolarhyde’s sort of man. He’s too stubborn, too unbending, too relentlessly _good_ to ever be on Dolarhyde’s side in any sort of dispute. This is the Wild West, after all. It does no one any good to have any sort of morals.

In Absolution, though, it had seemed appropriate to offer him the Sheriff position. He’d showed up with his young daughter, and he’d needed a job. Dolarhyde had needed someone who would keep the peace and stay out of his way.

Over the years, Dolarhyde’s wife had left him, his son had grown into a scoundrel, and Taggart had come by both a good-for-nothing son-in-law and a tadpole of a grandson who could usually be found tagging along with any adults who would have him.

Absolution had never become the success they’d hoped. But it hadn’t been as lonely as they’d feared, either.

For him it only takes an argument, his blood boiling at Taggart’s goddamn foolish sense of justice. For Taggart it normally takes a good sight more alcohol than could get Doc’s entire saloon drunk. But it’s always a relief when it happens, when they both have enough excuses to allow the tearing of clothes, dirty fingers against hot flesh, shoving against walls and desks and bars so hard there’ll be bruises for a week after.

Neither of them is young anymore, and perhaps that’s what makes it forgivable.

“How’s your head?”

An innocent enough question, even if it’s a strange one coming from him. But plenty of them have had changes of heart in the past few days, and he’s trying his damn best to be some sort of father to Percy now, the father he should’ve been to Nat years ago.

“Hard to crack as ever.” Taggart might be smiling up at him. Might just be squinting into the sun.

There’s rebuilding going on all around them, deputies and farmhands alike pitching in to help reconstruct the burned buildings.

“Remember much?” He tries his hardest not to sound too concerned.

“It’s coming back to me…”

Dolarhyde had talked to Percy and Maria first, seeing how much they recalled. And, dazed and shocked as they were by the entire experience, they seemed to have recovered fairly well. He’d even grabbed Emmett and asked him how his Grandpa was doing, trying hard not to sound as though the answer was of any importance at all. But every reassurance can’t quite get to the heart of the matter.

There’s a long distance between remembering the letter of New Mexico law and remembering a few long, dark nights with bottles of bourbon and Woodrow Dolarhyde.

Taggart gets to his feet and begins to stroll, dog tailing his heels. “We’re going to be busy when the railroad comes. Don’t suppose I could convince you to lend me some of your men.”

“You wouldn’t want any of ‘em.”

“Maybe not.” At the end of the boardwalk, Taggart steps down to the sand and turns down the alley, away from the main street. “I meant to thank you for looking after Emmett while I was… away. He’s like a completely different boy, now. Fearless. Taking responsibility. It’s like he got five years older in a few days.”

“He’s a good kid,” Dolarhyde mutters, unused to the compliment. “But you’ve been trying to look after my boy for years, John. That boy needed some discipline,” _and some love_ , he silently adds.

At the end of the alleyway there’s nothing but desert, spread out before them for miles. “Well,” Taggart says. “Maybe between the two of us we can set those boys to rights. And the entire town with them. If we can stop fighting for the sake of fighting.”

“Wasn’t always for the sake of fighting.”

Taggart looks at him, and he’s always so damn cool on the surface that Dolarhyde just can’t tell whether it’s honest curiosity in his eyes or something more. So he just reaches out and tips up Taggart’s hat so he can see his eyes… and the healing gash across his forehead.

“John…”

“I remember,” Taggart says, taking Dolarhyde’s arm by the wrist, and pulling him roughly into his chest like he’s about to whip out handcuffs. But…

It’s the first time he’s kissed Taggart without either of them being drunk. It’s strange… and scary as hell.

"John," he says, heart pounding in his chest, on completely unfamiliar territory whenever he's called to be the reasonable one.

It takes a moment for Taggart to collect himself. "My office. Tonight," he says finally. "And make sure I don't have to arrest anyone today or we'll have ourselves a little audience."

Dolarhyde's only ever been in the Sheriff's office to bail Percy out – or occasionally just to tear a strip off Taggart for putting the law above business. Tonight, though, he goes in with a bottle in his hand rather than a gun. Across the way, Doc's saloon is abuzz with music and drinking. No one's going to come in here unless Taggart makes them.

"Evening." Taggart's shut and locked the door before Dolarhyde even sees him. He moves quickly for an old guy. Rumor has it he was once quite the shot, which might explain how he's survived all these years despite his good nature.

"Evening." Dolarhyde holds out the bottle. Doing this without the benefit of alcohol or a raging fury means it almost seems like he's courting a girl. And not the type he can buy with a few pennies either.

Taggart takes the bourbon from him and finds two glasses. Pours. "Think we'll see Lonergan again?"

"The frontier's getting smaller all the time."

"And those demons?" Maybe that's the real question. Dolarhyde had come close to losing his son, and even his own life, but he hadn't been lassoed up off the ground like a herd animal, beaten and hurt and had his memory wiped. How could someone recover from that?

"Drink," he says, and pushes a glass into Taggart's hand. "Sit down. You'll feel better."

Taggart obeys, taking off his hat and looking up at him with keen eyes, as if searching out the answer to a riddle. "Some would think you were the one with the memory loss."

"No," Dolarhyde says, leaning back against the desk and downing his own drink. "If they'd done that to me I'd still be the same bastard I always was. It's having more memories that changed me, not less."

"We have to work together now," Taggart is saying as Dolarhyde pushes in, pressing his palm to Taggart's cheek, feeling John's breath on his lips. "If that's the only lesson, it's a good one."

"Yes," Dolarhyde agrees. "But it's not the only lesson."

His times with Taggart have always been rough, but they've never hurt as much as he sometimes think they should. And this time... this time John's kissing him like he might kiss a girl (well, an especially tall, craggy, stubbly girl at that), and it doesn't seem wrong or disrespectful. He just wants more.

"Jesus, John…" His fingers ghost over Taggart's gold star, tearing at buttons, his other hand tangled up in Taggart's hair. He shouldn't be the one who's so needy, who wants this so much… But then he catches a look at Taggart's eyes and realizes he's not the only one. They wouldn't be here, doing this, if he was.

"One day we have to do this in bed," Taggart growls, but there’s humor in his voice as his fingertips dig under Dolarhyde’s shirt.

“I’ve got a gold claim to sell you if you believe that.”

Taggart laughs just as Dolarhyde rips open his vest, his shirt coming with it, minus a few buttons. He’d pause to enjoy the moment – he can’t recall a time he’s actually seen John _happy_ \- but they don’t have time, and besides, his attention is firmly focused on what’s below the beltline.

His hand pushes into Taggart’s crotch so hard and desperate it should probably bring tears to the other man’s eyes, but Taggart just groans softly, shifting position in the hard wooden chair so he can move against Dolarhyde’s hand. Dolarhyde tugs open his belt, and finds himself a handful of John’s warmth – hard, needy flesh sliding against his palm.

For a second, and only a second, he thinks about what it might taste like to have another man in his mouth. But he’s no woman and no whore. Not tonight, anyway, even if it gives him such a surge of adrenaline to see the power he holds over Taggart right now, able to make him gasp for pleasure or bite his lip white with arousal, just with the slightest movement of his hand.

But he grabs a fistful of Taggart’s shirt instead, hauling him up before swiftly unfastening his own pants. Sometimes he forgets how scrawny John really is under all his clothes and the aura of authority the badge and gun give him. He needs a good meal even more than most in Absolution, and not cooked by that grandson of his either.

“Get over there,” he mutters, shoving Taggart up against the desk. This is how it had been all the other times, when being rough and rude was natural. Now it seems almost shameful. Taggart’s a man he respects… a _man_ , if it comes to that…

He’s about to reach for Taggart’s shoulder and, if not beg forgiveness, then at least…

“Fuck me, goddamn you,” Taggart groans, his breathing ragged as he braces himself against the desk, looking at Dolarhyde over his shoulder like some wild horse just begging to be tamed. “What’s a man got to do to get laid in this town?”

Oh, Jesus…

If he _were_ a whore, this would be easier with salves and lubricants and no concern for any feelings that might be rampaging through his gut. But he’s aching hard when his cock slides between Taggart’s thighs, and it’s curiosity that makes him reach for Taggart’s erection, feeling him thick and heavy with desire, and like nothing he’s ever felt before.

Everything suddenly moves with startling speed, and he’s thankful for that taking away the need to think or speak or do anything but enjoy the unnatural pleasure of fucking the sheriff, feeling Taggart’s cock grow and pulse and move in his hand with every stroke he makes between his thighs. All he can hear are gasped breaths and the blood in his ears, John gripping the edge of the desk so hard that solid oak might crumble, and…

Taggart climaxes right in his hand with a wordless cry, the tension going out of his body as he moves as if gripped by an unseen force, coming hot and sticky over Dolarhyde’s fingers. His mind wants to tell him how disgusting it is. The liquid warmth deep in his belly tells him otherwise as he spills out soon after, over skin and clothes. But then he’s pressed to John so close they might as well be one, exhausted but still smiling.

In the silence, Taggart’s voice is finally heard. “Now I could really use a drink.”

They wipe themselves clean as best they can, but there’s really nothing to be done other than baths and laundry. Dolarhyde finds the glasses and pours, tiny thrills of something more than momentary sexual satisfaction going through him. Maybe relief that this little piece of joy he’s found in his life hasn’t been obliterated by demon invasions. Maybe it’s just the idea of the fine, upright sheriff sitting at his desk with Woodrow Dolarhyde’s semen all over him.

“You should come for dinner,” he says as the bourbon lubricates his throat once more. “Bring Emmett. We’ll have us some fine steaks.”

John looks up at him, calm and stoic as ever, but with a new light in his eyes. “I’d like that.”

Woodrow pours them both another drink.


End file.
